THE TARGET RACES Prior to the November 6, 2012 General Election, the California Target Book, which I publish, identified ten congressional districts, four state senate districts and six assembly districts as targets. These are twenty districts that both political parties – and several of their like-minded independent expenditure committees – spent serious dollars in an [...]

Under the new top two Open Primary held last June, the top two vote getters, regardless of political party, enter the November runoff.  This resulted in twenty-eight races that the top two candidates were of the same political party. In most of the races neither candidate can win on base vote alone, meaning they need [...]

This year, California is looking at the largest number of competitive races for Congress this state has seen in decades. And the outcome could possibly determine which political party controls the House of Representatives after November. President Obama and Senator Dianne Feinstein will most certainly carry California in their races for reelection. However, how well [...]

Part One of this series described the Assembly districts the California Target Book has labeled as targets or that are on the watch list. Now I turn to the state Senate races. Last week, Darrell Steinberg, the president pro term of the Senate, announced that he would skip the Democratic National Convention to focus on [...]

This year, due to redistricting and the new top two Open Primary, there will be more two-party competitive congressional and state legislative races this November than we have seen in this state in over a decade. The California Target Book, which I publish, has tagged six Assembly races, four state Senate races and no fewer [...]

If we did not have the top two Open Primary Election on June 5 … Brad Sherman would be returning to Washington, D.C. as David the Giant Slayer. Pete Stark would have been guaranteed at least two more years in Congress. Former GOP Assembly Member Rico Oller would be thanking his tea party supporters for [...]

Last Monday I wrote that as many as 34 of the contested races in the June Open Primary could lead to a same party runoff in November: 8 in Congress, 4 in the state Senate, and as many as 22 in the state Assembly.  (I have since added one additional assembly race, bringing the total [...]

When Bette Davis spoke the above line in the classic movie, All About Eve, I’m certain she did not have California politics in mind. But it fittingly describes how many of California’s most powerful power brokers will feel the night of June 5 … the date of the state’s first Top-Two Open Primary Election. In [...]

The passage of Proposition 14 in the June 2010 Primary Election set into place a significant change in how we elect our representatives in Congress, the state Senate and Assembly. Under Proposition 14, all candidates in each congressional district and state legislative district will appear on the same ballot. Voters, regardless of their own personal [...]